First Place- Denver Broncos 9-7. The big off-season news involved quarterbacks. Andrew Luck and Bob Griffin in the draft and Peyton Manning leaving the Colts after a hundred years and going to Denver. Denver trading Tim Tebow to the Jets. The big question of course is will Peyton last the season? Neck injuries are something to be concerned about. If he plays the entire season, and until last year he had a very durable career, the Broncos should win this division. It is not the division it used to be. The Broncos were 8-8 last year with questionable play at QB. Tebow had a flair for the dramatic but Manning if healthy is a huge upgrade.  Willie Mcgahee has a lot of tread wear on this tires. Maybe he has one more 1000 yard season in him. The defense didn’t look great statistically last year but they kept the Broncos in games-for Tebow to pull out. Von Miller is one of the up and coming defenders in the league. Champ Bailey is still playing? He may go on forever like Darrell Green did.

Second Place-San Diego Chargers 9-7  This team is the most underachiving team of the past decade. Paper champions for so many years. The biggest mystery to me is how Norv Turner keeps a job. Norv Turner has coached the most games in NFL history among head coaches with a career losing record. This is his 15th year as a head coach. By all accounts Norv is a good guy. He was a brilliant offensive coordinator but he has as much business being a head coach as I would. He’s not a leader. He’s a great offensive mind who needs to be on the sidelines calling plays behind a great head coach [like say a Jimmy Johnson} One of the great mysteries of life-Norv Turner and also how Dave Wannestadt was a head coach in the NFL for so long. Anyway. They need Rivers to have a comeback season. Vincent Jackson has gone off to Tampa Bay. The team still has talent but not an abundance of talent like say 4 or 5 years ago.

Third Place-9-7 Kansas City Chiefs. Really you could throw a dart at the teams in this division and whoever it hit could win it. I am not overly impressed with any of them but then again in the NFL these days the difference between the best and worst teams are not that much. Every team even the best ones have flaws. Kansas City was hit hard by injuries last year and still managed to go 7-9. Their playmaker on offense- Jamaal Charles only had 12 rushing attempts and on defense Eric Berry a pro bowl player as a rookie in 2010 got hurt game 1 and missed the year. This team seemed to like playing for Romeo Crennel after he took over.

Fourth Place- Oakland Raiders 6-10. They will have Carson Palmer for the full -season this year. After they traded the future for him last October he had a slow start but did improve as the season went into its second half. They have an array of wide receivers who are more like track stars than football players. The once Pride and Poise Boys-haven’t really done much in nearly 30 years.  Up until the mid 1980’s Al Davis was considered a genius. Somewhere along the way he lost it. The theory is when he was spending all his time suing the league and Pete Roselle- they both ended up like Ali-and Frazier-neither were the same after those battles. Don’t be fooled. Al Davis may be dead but nothing is done in Oakland without his approval. He made some kind of special arrangement. Darren McFadden is great when he plays but he’s injury prone. The Raiders won’t be a pushover this season but they will take a step back losing 2 more games than last year..The inter-division games in this season in the AFC West will be hard to predict. These teams are all average to above average. There is no doormat like Cleveland /Jacksonville or Miami for the other division teams to kick around twice each.